1) is so far outside of normal/. review material as to be viewed as an external intrusion, hence the assumption of an ad. Clicking the link, there doesn't even seem to be a geek connection--it's either a big casual clothing store (ala Old Navy) or an outdoors store (ala... some outdoors store.)
2) is written in such a way as to reek of unimaginative marketing setup. Describing the "intended" user, someone who is recognizable; quick list of item highlights; groan-inducing attempt at humor.
3) should have been posted by you. It's your review, why not use terms like "I" and post it to/. with your account?
In short, even if you had altruistic/innocent intentions, everything about this "story" smells like a paid advertisement, and a poorly conceived one at that.
While this won't help the new-to-the-scene indie developer, I have to wonder if this isn't the future for mid-sized developers, maybe even film/show producers.
Take a company with a cult following or small but highly-respected developer who has trouble getting published because publishers see their games as "risky" since they aren't Cowadooty Clone 5, put their project on Kickstarter and allow the public to "purchase early" in order to fund it. In fact, if the company has multiple potential projects but can only focus on one, they could stick them all on Kickstarter and people could literally "vote with their money". The project that raises the most money is the one that gets developed, those who buy in to the other projects can opt to move their funds to the winner, get a refund(?), or have an alternative available (well, you don't get this game, but we'll give you a super pack from our catalog). They can then use the second-most popular as the next project, thus only needing Kickstarter when interest dies down.
This could be easily adaptable for indie film producers, as well. Hopefully crowdfunding picks up, there are a lot of "core" gamers who are willing to put their money where their mouth is and can fund games that actually try stuff instead of being cookie-cutter. The cookie-cutter games will always have their place, but more and more the niche games can get out there.
Imagine if Valve (certainly not a mid-sized developer) did a Kickstarter project for Episode 3. "Fine, fine, you all want it, pony up first." I'm sure they'd hit a million or two within a week.
I think the worst thing about this is that the public in general will see his drug use as being worse than his dishonesty/reality warping. I'm by no means excusing it, but I'd rather have a user than a liar any day.
(It's funny that I went to actually RTFA and it was barely longer than the/. summary with no additional information.)
If there's any intelligence in the management level of TSA, they'll realize that pushing the issue and trying to apply the fine will only incur more of Senator Paul's ire and help to make his case against them. So they won't apply the penalty to save their own jobs.
For those that want more information, pick up the book "Mountains Beyond Mountains" by Tracy Kidder. It was required reading for my Senior Ethics class in Uni, though I only read 3/4 of the book at the time. Earlier this year I actually read it the whole way through. Not only is it very well written and often humorous, it talks about a very interesting character, one Dr. Paul Farmer, and his ongoing efforts against TB globally, specifically at the poverty level in countries (mainly Haiti) where they would consider the U.S. poverty level middle class. Farmer does a lot more than just TB work, but much of his life has been devoted to lowering the cost for TB medication and advising various governments on TB programs (including Russia's prison epidemic).
I'm sure you could find more complete information about TB and its history in medical textbooks, but Mountains Beyond Mountains gives a very good intro to it (in a modern sense) while also making for good reading.
Why just say "internet"? That sounds too specific to me. General information, that is, information that has been made available for the public in any form, should be a human right. The Internet is only one way to access this, but that should be why it would fall under that.
I have a Toshiba netbook running Win7 right now that I'm considering downgrading to XP. The book just can't handle the power that Win7 needs (even after I turned off all the fancy graphics and trimmed services) without stuttering along here and there (and don't get me started on HDD access--it takes forever and a day just for the Save File dialog to come up in anything).
Let's face it, 7 just doesn't cut it for older and under-power machines. Plus, if I'm running something processor-intensive that doesn't need the bells and whistles, I'm going to choose an OS that isn't as processor-intensive itself (yes, yes, *nux, but not everything runs on that.) For that I might even jump back to 2K (but not 98, blech).
(But not necessarily "fix" them; fixing implies the original model was a good one.)
1) Stick small-group theaters on the end. Slightly smaller screen, only seats 30-40. Attach a lounge room (with a view of the screen) and rent the whole shebang out, medium size companies will eat it up for single-day retreats/training. Great for birthdays on the weekend, or club/group events. Hell, why not fundraising efforts to go with it? Rent to them, they can sell the tickets. When not being rented, show fifth-run/classics for cheap ($2/$3). And when a movie is run like that, run it for a whole week or two, none of this "we'll run it one night and maybe do it again in five months" BS. Put up nice schedules for what will be shown (reservations have to be at least two weeks in advance so there's no rapid changing of the schedule).
2) Attach a small video rental store to the theater. Those xth-run/classics? When playing them, put a display out front so if someone really likes the movie they can stroll in, buy a copy, stroll out. Offer free movie viewings for frequent rentals (or free rentals for frequent viewings). Maybe make a thing that if they keep their ticket for seeing a first-run in the theater and bring it back when the movie releases to DVD, they get a buck off the movie or something. (Yeah, not many will save the ticket, but it's just one more perk to throw out there.)
3) Thursday to Sunday, after 8 or 9, put a strict age limit on who can get into higher-rated movies. PG13 can only have 13 YOs and up; Rs 17 and up. Make it 21+ after 11 to get rid of the high school crowd. Seriously tighten down on crying infants, talking, and phone use. Hire a bouncer in more popular theaters to kick out unruly groups (and make sure there are signs that say no refunds if you are).
4) Actually have the movie start when it says it will start. I'm so sick of going to theaters, sitting down at the stated time, only to sit through 10 minutes of commercials + 15 minutes of previews. I have no problem with commercials on the big screen, just play them before said time. Intermingle these with previews so people actually want to show up a bit early, causing more eyeballs on the commercials.
5) Reusable 3D glasses. The glasses I got were fine at the end of the movie last time, they'll work for this one, too. Why should I have to pay $2 when I can bring my own? Sell moderate-quality pairs for $15/pop and save the extra fee on the movie. Helps with the whole recycling thing, too.
There's more I'm forgetting, but these are things I've thought of for a while now.
Speaking of the format wars, why not chose HD-DVD as the format for the 720?
It's a proven format; it only lost in terms of sales.
Blu-ray still has only a small portion of the movie market, so DVD-only playback won't hurt them much. And during the format wars we had dual-players, so if they really want they can do that, too.
I'm sure there are still some machines used for pressing them sitting around in warehouses.
And, most important:
Piracy. Piracy. Piracy. With HDDVD as the losing format, there are almost no HDDVD consumer burners out there, and the amount of blank HDDVDs is finite. This will make pirating for the 720 exceedingly hard, if not impossible, which is something that a lot of developers are worried about.
As an active duty soldier, this doesn't really pump me up much. Most MREs include a packet of coffee or tea (which I think is caffeinated). True, those require some sort of water/container, but many MREs already have Ranger Bars, which are like those energy bars you can get at the grocery store (which work to varying degrees).
Now, when they get rid of the Vegetarian Omelet MRE, then there will be some cheering.
(Some MREs have other, ah, means of keeping you awake...)
Unlike most, I consider this a bonus. I miss the days when Facebook was a network only for those with.edu accounts; call me elitist, but it lowered the overall crap ratio on Facebook. Google+, at least for now, is kind of the same way; the only people on there are those with a lot of tech know-how, and the vast majority of my friends (i.e. people I really want to follow) are tech-minded, so they already have it.
The only thing I really miss from Facebook is Pages. It was nice to get micro-updates in a central location about things I'm a fan of; twitter doesn't count, mainly due to the whole brevity of statements.
I'm sure that as Facebook continues to piss people off with its radical redesigns and privacy issues, Google+ will continue to add new features (especially when they can integrate into things like Google Calendar or Google Maps), and more will jump, but for now I'm not complaining much.
Please say this means more Beaker and Bunsen. While more Muppets than Sesame Street, they could still have a (hilarious) place in such education entertainment.
Of course, Bunsen might need to learn a bit of science, first...
Not quite. The copyright doesn't differ to them entirely, even if it's a protected thesis, but you are also limited in how you can distribute it yourself, even if it's public.
But for your thesis to be accepted by the college, it has to first be approved by the corporation; there are methods to get around this in case there's a falling out or the company otherwise drops out of the internship program, but I hear they're hard and time-consuming. So, yeah, the corporation can hold your education for ransom if you get a dick boss.
The thesis program at my campus is a joint progress between the campus thesis department and the internship the student undertakes. Every senior's thesis is about a real-world project that they develop and implement at the company they intern with; some theses have saved companies millions of dollars or increased the efficiency in processes by two or three times. Because of this, they are often seen as "works for hire"; the company is given the option up-front to make the thesis "protected" (not their term, but I forget the actual phrase) which means it's not viewable by the public (the college maintains a small library with all past theses).
"Work for hire" might be the wrong terminology, but there were copyright issues at work when I went through my thesis.
This. When I wrote my thesis (for my bachelor's in CompSci), my Thesis department basically said "this is a work for hire, we own the rights to it, you can share it personally for academic pursuits" or something along those lines.
It's been my experience that those who go into the scientific majors are far more interested in the course subjects, whereas those going for the "catch all" degrees of Liberal Arts and Management are just in it for a degree so they can place better in the job market.
As such, it would seem that there would be an inverse tuition based on this: Show the university that you *really* want that boring degree by paying more for it. Hopefully this would get more people interested in a scientific degree, which they would hop out of when they discovered that it's too hard for them. But for some, they'll find that they actually enjoy science and engineering.
Article didn't seem to mention it, but do they consider the offset the internet provides? A lot of people shop online now, so instead of spending the gas to go buy a CD or something else, it's instead downloaded digitally or ordered online; I don't have the stats to back it up, but I would think that mass shipping is more efficient than a hundred individuals driving to the mall.
...and only for older/"smaller" items. With anything done over digital distribution, if someone pays $0 then you are out only the cost of the bandwidth used to transfer the item in question. With older items, which have already been sold at a regular price (and hopefully recouped production costs), anything anyone pays is a bonus, because more likely than not those people would never have purchased that item. I know that I would never have purchased any of the games in HB2 myself, but when I'm able to name my own price it becomes a different factor altogether. (The charity part helped, but if I was doing it for the charity I would have just donated to one of the charities directly.)
See, people like to feel in control, some more than others. By allowing someone to name their price, they're given an extra elation in governing the world around them. Most probably use this new-found power to freeload, but others will happily pay a price that suits them. I bet that if you did a comparison of what people paid for each "name your price" item, you'd find almost no correlation to the actual stated value of that item, because at this point the value of the item is out the window and it's about what the person is "willing to give up" that states what they pay.
In some cases this actually means they will pay more than the stated value because they get a bonus--not only do they get the power of pricing in the situation, they get to "show off" with what they think is a high number, regardless if it's really a high number to them or to the seller, so long as it gives the appearance of a high amount of money relative to the item. (Think big man in nice suit walks down the street, stops at a lemonade stand, hands over a five for a 50 cent glass, and walks away with a big smirk. Kids are happy for an entirely different reason.)
Especially for products that require no upkeep (i.e. they don't maintain servers or patches or updates anymore), once the producer has reached a certain profitability on the product it's to their benefit to do a "pay what you want" model. Not only does it give the product a second life as people report "hey you can get this cheap!", it can be used to build up towards other products or otherwise garner good will towards the brand. It also gives them a better idea of what people *want* to pay for the product, as opposed to what they're willing to pay, which may change how the pricing scheme and money put into the next product are set up.
So wish I had mod points. I had only heard of Feynman once or twice in college; last year I found his "random occurrences" autobiography online (Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!), and he is basically awesome. He is probably what every geek with a social desire seeks to be. He beds a decent amount of ladies, discovers useful math for the wobbling of plates that is later used to describe particle movement (IIRC), and does nude drawings. I wish I had even 1/10th the charisma, interest, and genius that Feynman did.
He is certainly one of my personal heroes\rolemodels (joining the ranks of other greats such as Bob Barker and Ben Franklin).
You missed the point. Many Americans don't want their money to go towards paying the healthcare of others; if someone else pays for it, they couldn't give a rat's ass.
It's not that they don't want the poor people helped, it's that they don't want to help the poor people.
We Americans don't care that we spend twice as much on health care, so long as that amount is spent "only on us". Joe Sixpack has no problem with high premiums as long as he's not covering some poor person's health costs.
When I was a kid, we'd capture fireflies and put them in empty soda bottles. When we wanted them to light up, we'd shake the bottle real hard. I think the army can handle that.
I've always wondered why arcades haven't gotten the same treatment as, say, radio parts. It's pretty rare to find a store for radio parts (or just electronic parts in general), but there are lots of stores that have a section for them (Radioshack (for now), for instance).
To me, arcades would seem to go hand-in-hand with a video game store. Stick a few arcade machines in the back with one or two out front to lure people in. Those who come to play the arcades will likely browse the store and make a purchase or two. Those who come to buy video games will probably put in a quarter or two to play Centipede or Street Fighter II (or Monster Jam).
Granted, your small Gamestops and what not in malls won't have the room, but I've seen many fairly spacious game stores (especially for their stock), so it would be a nice side revenue/attraction.
Not having a PhD, no data, and not having RTFA, I'd guess that it's the second one.
As someone who suffers from regular bouts of depression (as well as daily depression periods relating to certain bodily functions), I know from first-hand experience that the internet is a great distraction for depression. You momentarily forget your woes when you find a video of a kitten going 'NOM NOM NOM' or play some flash game (or go to sexually gratifying websites.) Online communities are great because they are mostly homogeneous (sites like/. being an obvious exception; there's some homogeneity, but it's not all-encompassing like most communities), so you get communities for the few things you actually have interest in, or that share your general outlook on the world and so are great for complaining to or discussing with.
The internet allows you to lose some of yourself for a short while, and in a state of depression that's often something you want to do. It also keeps you away from real physical contact (at least for myself, in a depressed state I don't want to be around anyone) while being more active than just watching TV.
Slashdot Mirror
If this is an actual, personal review, it
1) is so far outside of normal /. review material as to be viewed as an external intrusion, hence the assumption of an ad. Clicking the link, there doesn't even seem to be a geek connection--it's either a big casual clothing store (ala Old Navy) or an outdoors store (ala... some outdoors store.)
2) is written in such a way as to reek of unimaginative marketing setup. Describing the "intended" user, someone who is recognizable; quick list of item highlights; groan-inducing attempt at humor.
3) should have been posted by you. It's your review, why not use terms like "I" and post it to /. with your account?
In short, even if you had altruistic/innocent intentions, everything about this "story" smells like a paid advertisement, and a poorly conceived one at that.
While this won't help the new-to-the-scene indie developer, I have to wonder if this isn't the future for mid-sized developers, maybe even film/show producers.
Take a company with a cult following or small but highly-respected developer who has trouble getting published because publishers see their games as "risky" since they aren't Cowadooty Clone 5, put their project on Kickstarter and allow the public to "purchase early" in order to fund it. In fact, if the company has multiple potential projects but can only focus on one, they could stick them all on Kickstarter and people could literally "vote with their money". The project that raises the most money is the one that gets developed, those who buy in to the other projects can opt to move their funds to the winner, get a refund(?), or have an alternative available (well, you don't get this game, but we'll give you a super pack from our catalog). They can then use the second-most popular as the next project, thus only needing Kickstarter when interest dies down.
This could be easily adaptable for indie film producers, as well. Hopefully crowdfunding picks up, there are a lot of "core" gamers who are willing to put their money where their mouth is and can fund games that actually try stuff instead of being cookie-cutter. The cookie-cutter games will always have their place, but more and more the niche games can get out there.
Imagine if Valve (certainly not a mid-sized developer) did a Kickstarter project for Episode 3. "Fine, fine, you all want it, pony up first." I'm sure they'd hit a million or two within a week.
I think the worst thing about this is that the public in general will see his drug use as being worse than his dishonesty/reality warping. I'm by no means excusing it, but I'd rather have a user than a liar any day.
(It's funny that I went to actually RTFA and it was barely longer than the /. summary with no additional information.)
If there's any intelligence in the management level of TSA, they'll realize that pushing the issue and trying to apply the fine will only incur more of Senator Paul's ire and help to make his case against them. So they won't apply the penalty to save their own jobs.
For those that want more information, pick up the book "Mountains Beyond Mountains" by Tracy Kidder. It was required reading for my Senior Ethics class in Uni, though I only read 3/4 of the book at the time. Earlier this year I actually read it the whole way through. Not only is it very well written and often humorous, it talks about a very interesting character, one Dr. Paul Farmer, and his ongoing efforts against TB globally, specifically at the poverty level in countries (mainly Haiti) where they would consider the U.S. poverty level middle class. Farmer does a lot more than just TB work, but much of his life has been devoted to lowering the cost for TB medication and advising various governments on TB programs (including Russia's prison epidemic).
I'm sure you could find more complete information about TB and its history in medical textbooks, but Mountains Beyond Mountains gives a very good intro to it (in a modern sense) while also making for good reading.
Amazon link: http://www.amazon.com/Mountains-Beyond-Healing-World-Farmer/dp/0375506160
Why just say "internet"? That sounds too specific to me. General information, that is, information that has been made available for the public in any form, should be a human right. The Internet is only one way to access this, but that should be why it would fall under that.
I have a Toshiba netbook running Win7 right now that I'm considering downgrading to XP. The book just can't handle the power that Win7 needs (even after I turned off all the fancy graphics and trimmed services) without stuttering along here and there (and don't get me started on HDD access--it takes forever and a day just for the Save File dialog to come up in anything).
Let's face it, 7 just doesn't cut it for older and under-power machines. Plus, if I'm running something processor-intensive that doesn't need the bells and whistles, I'm going to choose an OS that isn't as processor-intensive itself (yes, yes, *nux, but not everything runs on that.) For that I might even jump back to 2K (but not 98, blech).
(But not necessarily "fix" them; fixing implies the original model was a good one.)
1) Stick small-group theaters on the end. Slightly smaller screen, only seats 30-40. Attach a lounge room (with a view of the screen) and rent the whole shebang out, medium size companies will eat it up for single-day retreats/training. Great for birthdays on the weekend, or club/group events. Hell, why not fundraising efforts to go with it? Rent to them, they can sell the tickets. When not being rented, show fifth-run/classics for cheap ($2/$3). And when a movie is run like that, run it for a whole week or two, none of this "we'll run it one night and maybe do it again in five months" BS. Put up nice schedules for what will be shown (reservations have to be at least two weeks in advance so there's no rapid changing of the schedule).
2) Attach a small video rental store to the theater. Those xth-run/classics? When playing them, put a display out front so if someone really likes the movie they can stroll in, buy a copy, stroll out. Offer free movie viewings for frequent rentals (or free rentals for frequent viewings). Maybe make a thing that if they keep their ticket for seeing a first-run in the theater and bring it back when the movie releases to DVD, they get a buck off the movie or something. (Yeah, not many will save the ticket, but it's just one more perk to throw out there.)
3) Thursday to Sunday, after 8 or 9, put a strict age limit on who can get into higher-rated movies. PG13 can only have 13 YOs and up; Rs 17 and up. Make it 21+ after 11 to get rid of the high school crowd. Seriously tighten down on crying infants, talking, and phone use. Hire a bouncer in more popular theaters to kick out unruly groups (and make sure there are signs that say no refunds if you are).
4) Actually have the movie start when it says it will start. I'm so sick of going to theaters, sitting down at the stated time, only to sit through 10 minutes of commercials + 15 minutes of previews. I have no problem with commercials on the big screen, just play them before said time. Intermingle these with previews so people actually want to show up a bit early, causing more eyeballs on the commercials.
5) Reusable 3D glasses. The glasses I got were fine at the end of the movie last time, they'll work for this one, too. Why should I have to pay $2 when I can bring my own? Sell moderate-quality pairs for $15/pop and save the extra fee on the movie. Helps with the whole recycling thing, too.
There's more I'm forgetting, but these are things I've thought of for a while now.
And, most important:
As an active duty soldier, this doesn't really pump me up much. Most MREs include a packet of coffee or tea (which I think is caffeinated). True, those require some sort of water/container, but many MREs already have Ranger Bars, which are like those energy bars you can get at the grocery store (which work to varying degrees).
Now, when they get rid of the Vegetarian Omelet MRE, then there will be some cheering.
(Some MREs have other, ah, means of keeping you awake...)
Unlike most, I consider this a bonus. I miss the days when Facebook was a network only for those with .edu accounts; call me elitist, but it lowered the overall crap ratio on Facebook. Google+, at least for now, is kind of the same way; the only people on there are those with a lot of tech know-how, and the vast majority of my friends (i.e. people I really want to follow) are tech-minded, so they already have it.
The only thing I really miss from Facebook is Pages. It was nice to get micro-updates in a central location about things I'm a fan of; twitter doesn't count, mainly due to the whole brevity of statements.
I'm sure that as Facebook continues to piss people off with its radical redesigns and privacy issues, Google+ will continue to add new features (especially when they can integrate into things like Google Calendar or Google Maps), and more will jump, but for now I'm not complaining much.
Please say this means more Beaker and Bunsen. While more Muppets than Sesame Street, they could still have a (hilarious) place in such education entertainment.
Of course, Bunsen might need to learn a bit of science, first...
Because my work place did pay me to write the thesis. Again, it was a joint-venture of sorts; that's mainly where the whole copyright thing comes in.
Not quite. The copyright doesn't differ to them entirely, even if it's a protected thesis, but you are also limited in how you can distribute it yourself, even if it's public.
But for your thesis to be accepted by the college, it has to first be approved by the corporation; there are methods to get around this in case there's a falling out or the company otherwise drops out of the internship program, but I hear they're hard and time-consuming. So, yeah, the corporation can hold your education for ransom if you get a dick boss.
The thesis program at my campus is a joint progress between the campus thesis department and the internship the student undertakes. Every senior's thesis is about a real-world project that they develop and implement at the company they intern with; some theses have saved companies millions of dollars or increased the efficiency in processes by two or three times. Because of this, they are often seen as "works for hire"; the company is given the option up-front to make the thesis "protected" (not their term, but I forget the actual phrase) which means it's not viewable by the public (the college maintains a small library with all past theses).
"Work for hire" might be the wrong terminology, but there were copyright issues at work when I went through my thesis.
This. When I wrote my thesis (for my bachelor's in CompSci), my Thesis department basically said "this is a work for hire, we own the rights to it, you can share it personally for academic pursuits" or something along those lines.
It's been my experience that those who go into the scientific majors are far more interested in the course subjects, whereas those going for the "catch all" degrees of Liberal Arts and Management are just in it for a degree so they can place better in the job market.
As such, it would seem that there would be an inverse tuition based on this: Show the university that you *really* want that boring degree by paying more for it. Hopefully this would get more people interested in a scientific degree, which they would hop out of when they discovered that it's too hard for them. But for some, they'll find that they actually enjoy science and engineering.
Article didn't seem to mention it, but do they consider the offset the internet provides? A lot of people shop online now, so instead of spending the gas to go buy a CD or something else, it's instead downloaded digitally or ordered online; I don't have the stats to back it up, but I would think that mass shipping is more efficient than a hundred individuals driving to the mall.
...and only for older/"smaller" items. With anything done over digital distribution, if someone pays $0 then you are out only the cost of the bandwidth used to transfer the item in question. With older items, which have already been sold at a regular price (and hopefully recouped production costs), anything anyone pays is a bonus, because more likely than not those people would never have purchased that item. I know that I would never have purchased any of the games in HB2 myself, but when I'm able to name my own price it becomes a different factor altogether. (The charity part helped, but if I was doing it for the charity I would have just donated to one of the charities directly.)
See, people like to feel in control, some more than others. By allowing someone to name their price, they're given an extra elation in governing the world around them. Most probably use this new-found power to freeload, but others will happily pay a price that suits them. I bet that if you did a comparison of what people paid for each "name your price" item, you'd find almost no correlation to the actual stated value of that item, because at this point the value of the item is out the window and it's about what the person is "willing to give up" that states what they pay.
In some cases this actually means they will pay more than the stated value because they get a bonus--not only do they get the power of pricing in the situation, they get to "show off" with what they think is a high number, regardless if it's really a high number to them or to the seller, so long as it gives the appearance of a high amount of money relative to the item. (Think big man in nice suit walks down the street, stops at a lemonade stand, hands over a five for a 50 cent glass, and walks away with a big smirk. Kids are happy for an entirely different reason.)
Especially for products that require no upkeep (i.e. they don't maintain servers or patches or updates anymore), once the producer has reached a certain profitability on the product it's to their benefit to do a "pay what you want" model. Not only does it give the product a second life as people report "hey you can get this cheap!", it can be used to build up towards other products or otherwise garner good will towards the brand. It also gives them a better idea of what people *want* to pay for the product, as opposed to what they're willing to pay, which may change how the pricing scheme and money put into the next product are set up.
So wish I had mod points. I had only heard of Feynman once or twice in college; last year I found his "random occurrences" autobiography online (Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!), and he is basically awesome. He is probably what every geek with a social desire seeks to be. He beds a decent amount of ladies, discovers useful math for the wobbling of plates that is later used to describe particle movement (IIRC), and does nude drawings. I wish I had even 1/10th the charisma, interest, and genius that Feynman did.
He is certainly one of my personal heroes\rolemodels (joining the ranks of other greats such as Bob Barker and Ben Franklin).
You missed the point. Many Americans don't want their money to go towards paying the healthcare of others; if someone else pays for it, they couldn't give a rat's ass.
It's not that they don't want the poor people helped, it's that they don't want to help the poor people.
We Americans don't care that we spend twice as much on health care, so long as that amount is spent "only on us". Joe Sixpack has no problem with high premiums as long as he's not covering some poor person's health costs.
When I was a kid, we'd capture fireflies and put them in empty soda bottles. When we wanted them to light up, we'd shake the bottle real hard. I think the army can handle that.
One check please.
I've always wondered why arcades haven't gotten the same treatment as, say, radio parts. It's pretty rare to find a store for radio parts (or just electronic parts in general), but there are lots of stores that have a section for them (Radioshack (for now), for instance).
To me, arcades would seem to go hand-in-hand with a video game store. Stick a few arcade machines in the back with one or two out front to lure people in. Those who come to play the arcades will likely browse the store and make a purchase or two. Those who come to buy video games will probably put in a quarter or two to play Centipede or Street Fighter II (or Monster Jam).
Granted, your small Gamestops and what not in malls won't have the room, but I've seen many fairly spacious game stores (especially for their stock), so it would be a nice side revenue/attraction.
Not having a PhD, no data, and not having RTFA, I'd guess that it's the second one.
As someone who suffers from regular bouts of depression (as well as daily depression periods relating to certain bodily functions), I know from first-hand experience that the internet is a great distraction for depression. You momentarily forget your woes when you find a video of a kitten going 'NOM NOM NOM' or play some flash game (or go to sexually gratifying websites.) Online communities are great because they are mostly homogeneous (sites like /. being an obvious exception; there's some homogeneity, but it's not all-encompassing like most communities), so you get communities for the few things you actually have interest in, or that share your general outlook on the world and so are great for complaining to or discussing with.
The internet allows you to lose some of yourself for a short while, and in a state of depression that's often something you want to do. It also keeps you away from real physical contact (at least for myself, in a depressed state I don't want to be around anyone) while being more active than just watching TV.